Luke 1,67-79. 1st Sunday in Advent

✠ One Message: Christ crucified and risen for you ✠

Luke 1,67-79   113

1. Sonntag im Advent  01  Populous Zion 

Bibiana, Virgin Martyr at Rome, † 363 

2. December 2012

1. O Lord, our Heavenly Father, we give You most humble and hearty thanks for the consolation ministered to us in the gift of Your dear Son Jesus Christ, whom You did send to be a King and Savior, to redeem His people from their sin and to deliver them from the might of Satan and the power of everlasting death. We beseech You to grant unto us Your Holy Spirit to enlighten, govern and sanctify our hearts, so that we may truly acknowledge Him as our King and Savior, and perpetually cling to Him; and at all times grant unto us a true and living faith, so that we may not stumble at His humiliation, Word and Reign, which the world esteems so lightly (Löhe 119).  Amen. 

2. And his father Zechariah was filled with the Holy Spirit and prophesied, saying: „Praise be to the Lord God of Israel, for He has visited and redeemed His people and has raised up a horn of salvation for us in the house of His servant David, as He spoke by the mouth of His holy prophets from of old, that we should be saved from our enemies and from the hand of all who hate us; to show the mercy promised to our fathers and to remember His holy covenant, the oath that He swore to our father Abraham, to grant us that we, being delivered from the hand of our enemies, might serve Him without fear, in holiness and righteousness before Him all our days. And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most High; for you will go before the Lord to prepare His ways, to give knowledge of salvation to His people in the forgiveness of their sins, because of the tender mercy of our God, whereby the sunrise shall visit us from on high to give light to those who are seated in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace.“  

3. Zechariah was a priest in the temple. He was the father of John, older cousin to Jesus. This John would become known as John the Baptizer three decades later. Human frailty prevented John and his wife, Elizabeth, from having children. Both were old, and Elizabeth was barren. They were in the twilight of their years and the shadow of death encroached ever upon them. 

4. We have our own frailties, too. Old age, chronic diseases and a host of other ailments wreck havoc upon our mind, body and spirit. These frailties, however, are merely symptoms of our much larger condition: our inherited wickedness that has been passed down to us by our parents. With original sin lurking in the deepest corners of our body and soul, we are people who are seated in darkness and wallow in the shadow of death. The grave and abandonment in Hades are what await you and me as a sinner. 

5. Yahweh our Triune God is a God of action. First to Adam and Eve, He promised to send a savior for His fallen mankind. This promise was given to Abraham and Sarah, childless at the time, that through their son would descend this savior of mankind. At Sinai, Yahweh chose Isaac’s grandson Levi as the priestly tribe. Zechariah was a Levite descending from the clan of Abijah (my Father is Yahweh). Zechariah attended to the holy things of Yahweh for the holy people of Yahweh. Zechariah’s firstborn son, John, was the great herald for Jesus the Christ. 

6. The 1. Sunday in Advent begins the new Church Year with the historic reading from the Palm Sunday account in the Gospel according to Matthew. The four (4) weeks in Advent prepare us for the incarnation and birth of Jesus the Christ. Advent, therefore, begins with the emphasis on justification and salvation, and we traditionally refer to Jesus’ Palm Sunday procession as His triumphal entry into Jerusalem. Jesus was born into this fallen world to justify and save sinners. John the Baptizer prepared the way for Jesus, and thus Zechariah proclaims Yahweh’s salvation. 

7. Yahweh has raised up a Horn of Salvation for His people. The promise of a Mighty Savior had been made to Adam and Eve, and each successive generation received anew this promise of deliverance. By the time of King David, in 1000 BC, this promise had been connected to the lineage of David. A thousand years later, Zechariah the Priest proclaims that this Savior and Servant from the house of David is about to be born. 

8. The prophets from of old had spoken of this Mighty Savior. The Prophet Isaiah described Jesus as the one who has borne our infirmities and carried our diseases; by His bruises we are healed. The Righteous One, Yahweh’s Servant, makes all people righteous and He bears our iniquities (Isaiah 53,4-5.11). The Prophet Ezekiel described Jesus as the one who displays His holiness before the eyes of the nations so that they know that He is Yahweh (Ezekiel 36,23). The Prophet Micah proclaims Jesus pardons iniquity and passes over transgression; He has compassion upon us, and He treads our iniquities underfoot. He casts all our sins into the depths of the sea (Micah 7,18-19). 

9. In bearing our iniquities, Jesus has saved us from our enemies, which are sin, death and hell. The devil, with his accusations against us, has been silenced. His accusations have been answered by Jesus. Our Heavenly Father’s judgment from His bench is that we are not guilty. 

10. Yahweh shows mercy and remembers His holy covenant. His mercy proclaims that not only are we not guilty, but we are found innocent of all our sinful deeds and wicked ways. 

11. For Jesus gives us knowledge of our salvation by the forgiveness of our sins. Jesus has born the punishment to be meted out upon sin. Jesus bore the wrath of God the Father and suffered the death of sinners that the law rightly and justly verdicts upon the sinner. 

12. Jesus gives light to those seated in darkness and in the shadow of death. For those in the darkness Jesus is the Light, and for those in the shadow of death Jesus is the Life. The Apostle John speaks of this Divine Light and Life in his Gospel: »In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him, and without Him was not any thing made that was made. In Him was Life, and the Life was the Light of men. The Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. The True Light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world. He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, yet  the world did not know Him. He came to His own, and His own people did not receive Him.  But to all who did receive Him, who believed in His Name, He gave the right to become  children of God, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but were born of God« (John 1,1-5.9-13). 

13. Jesus guides our feet in the way of peace. The Apostle Peter told the Roman centurion Cornelius and his family: »As for the word that God the Father sent to Israel, preaching the gospel of peace through Jesus Christ who is Lord of all, to Him all the Prophets bear witness that everyone who believes in Him receives forgiveness of sins  through His Name« (Acts 10,36.43). 

14. Yahweh likes his pairs. He created mankind in His Divine image and likeness as male and female. He saved the animals during the Flood in pairs, two by two. Moses and Joshua with the glorious Sinai covenant. Elijah and Elisha the two greatest prophets in the Old Testament. Peter and Paul the two most influential apostles in the Western Church. A church and her pastor. Zachariah and Joseph the fathers of John and Jesus; Elizabeth and Mary their mothers. John and Jesus, one who prepared the way for the New Testament and the one who is the New Testament made flesh. 

15. John prepared the way for Jesus by preaching: »Repent, for the reign of heaven is at hand« (Matthew 3,2). This reign of heaven was manifested on Palm Sunday when Jesus entered Jerusalem where five days later He would be crucified in the place of sinners and raised as the first fruit of their resurrection. The reign of heaven is solus Christus (Christ alone) who entered Jerusalem as her rightful king who died as a cursed sinner and rose three days later as our Victorious Redeemer. We rejoice in this Savior’s first advent and we await his second.  Amen. 

16. Let us pray. O God, You shine forth from Zion and are the perfection of beauty; help us prepare for Jesus’s advent with repentant hearts so that when we celebrate His birth we may do so with joyful hearts certain of our forgiveness and eternal life.  Amen.

To God alone be the Glory 

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All Scriptural quotations are translations done by The Rev. Peter A. Bauernfeind using the Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia, 4th Edition © 1990 by the Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, Stuttgart, and the Novum Testamentum Graece, Nestle-Aland 27th Edition © 1993 by Deutsch Bibelgesellschaft, Stuttgart. 

ELKB. Evangelisch-Lutherische Kirche in Bayern. www.bayern-evangelisch.de/www/index.php. Copyright © Evangelisch-Lutherische Kirche in Bayern. 

Löhe, Wilhelm. Liturgy for Christian Congregations of the Lutheran Faith. Copyright © 1902 Frank Carroll Longaker.